


Coming Home (Your Eyes Look Like)

by deependlittleocean



Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Abandonment Issues, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, But only as friends!!!, Canon Divergence epikegster never happens, Fluff and Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Jack and Kent reconcile, Kid Fic, M/M, More tags will be added later to avoid spoilers, Multi, NOT JEFF THOUGH, Parent abandonment of child, Single Parent Jeff, hockey adjacent, mended friendship
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-11-19
Updated: 2019-03-17
Packaged: 2019-08-25 18:41:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 17,907
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16666153
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deependlittleocean/pseuds/deependlittleocean
Summary: If you asked Kent last year, he didn't think he'd be in the NHL playing for Vegas, he didn't think he'd be the leading point scorer, he didn't think he'd already be hearing whispers of captaincy. And he definitely didn't think he'd be already half in love with his single-father of a teammate.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> If you follow me over on Tumblr (wjpoindexters) you're probably a little familiar with the "Jeff Troy is a dad." fic that I write over there. I've decided to finally put it over here with any new additions.

When Kent had met Jeff Troy he was 18 and Jeff was 20. Jeff had been the one to pick Kent up from the airport, everyone thinking that since they were close in age Kent might be more comfortable with Jeff. Even though Kent was staying with one of the Veterans, Halvo, anyways. It didn’t really matter, Kent had come to Vegas to focus on hockey and to somehow get in touch with Zimm’s again and he needed to focus. He didn’t need a new best friend or whatever it was the Ace’s were trying to do.

Besides, Jeff was the most dad like person Kent had ever met in his life. The first thing he said to Kent upon entering his car was to put his seat belt on. He seemed to turn his blinker on exactly 100 feet in front of every turn, his hands were always 10 and 2. A total fucking dad. Which Kent wasn’t interested in right now. He didn’t need another friend who was going to lecture him.

When he mentioned off hand, how Jeff acted like more of a dad than the actual dads on the team, the Vet he was staying with, Halvo, looked at him like he had grown another head in the last two seconds.

“Swoops is a dad?” It was a statement, but it was a confused, how are you not getting this, kind of statement.

“What? No he isn’t!”

Two of Kent’s other teammates who had overheard the conversation came skating in at that moment. Brownie was a Dman only five years older than Kent and Tilly was on Kent’s line, way older than him, but he and Kent got along pretty well.

“We talking about Jeff and his 800 wallet photos of Billie?” Brownie asked leaning against the boards.

“You all are fucking with me right? This is like a thing you do to the new rookies? You all take turns pretending to have a kid you don’t actually have and see how long you can keep it going?” Kent asked, frustrated. Mostly because if it is, this is the longest a rookie has fallen for it. It's already months into the season.

“Uh no dude,” Tilly scoffed, “Swoops seriously has a kid. She’s like almost year old. Not even walking. He didn’t find out that long ago actually.” Brownie elbowed Tilly in the ribs gently to get him to shut up.

“So this isn’t some elaborate prank?” Kent asked, still not convinced it wasn’t.

“No man,” Brownie grinned at him, “but I wish it was. That would be hilarious. Maybe next year we can try and convince the rookies that Halvo is only 40!” Brownie laughed, skating away quickly before Halvo ( a very respectable 29) could swat at him.

* * *

“How come you didn’t tell me you had a kid?’ Kent asked a few days later when they were sitting on the bench during a game, right after a line change.

Jeff looked slightly taken aback, “what?”

“You didn’t tell me you had a kid. I wanna meet her.”

“It just never came up in conversation Parser, Jesus.” But Jeff looked cagey and sounded a little defensive and Kent couldn’t help but wonder if it was because Jeff didn’t want him near his kid when Kent seemed to already have gotten a reputation for being a partier.

“Can I meet her?”

“Can you…? I mean yeah sure if you want. Do you even like kids?”

“Yeah dude, I fucking love kids. I have like thirty cousins.”

Jeff seemed to consider that information for a moment before smiling, “yeah you can meet her, but Kent,” and then they were changing lines again and Kent had to go over the boards with Jeff to get on the ice, “if you swear in front of my kid I’m going to fine you.”

* * *

It’s actually a few weeks later when Kent finally does get to meet Jeff’s daughter. She stays with his mom a lot since Jeff is away on roadies and generally just has a shitty schedule. Kent had poked around a little and asked about her mom, but everyone seemed to be on the same page as having no clue about that.

Kent doesn’t know what you’re supposed to do when you go to a teammate’s house to meet their kids. He never had teammates with kids before. He almost thinks about calling his dad and asking her if he’s supposed to bring anything, but he feels stupid for even thinking it, so he doesn’t. He figures if this is an occasion when you’re supposed to bring something he’ll make up for it later.

He knocks on the door to Jeff’s apartment and Jeff answers it promptly. He’s wearing the most worn and soft jeans that Kent has ever seen and a plain black tshirt when he opens the door. He has a clippers hat on, pulled backwards like Kent wears his hats most of the time. He has a smile on his face that makes Kent forget about everything back in Montreal for two seconds.

“Come on in dude.” Jeff stands back lets Kent into the apartment.

Kent sees Billie almost immediately. She’s sitting on the carpet in the living room, some kind of weird round thing getting gnawed on in her mouth. Kent thinks she has more hair than most kids her age do, all dark curls just like Jeff. She looks up when the two of them walk further into the room and giggles at Jeff happily. Kent is suddenly more nervous than he was before.

It’s not like he’s trying to date Jeff or anything and this is the “meet my kids” test he has to pass before Jeff will start letting him stay at this place overnight. Jeff isn’t even that much older than him. Some parts of the year they’re only separated by two numbers instead of three. But Jeff is way more mature than Kent thinks he’ll ever be and he feels like he’s 30 already.

Jeff stops in front of Billie and says dramatically, for her sake or for his Kent isn’t sure, “Billie, this is Kenny, daddy’s teammate. He’s really awkward and hasn’t ever talked to someone your age before, so make sure to be nice to him.” He’s grinning at Kent when he says it.

“Oh fu-fudge,” Kent was about to tell Jeff to fuck off but then he remembered the whole cursing rule and caught himself just in time. He’s not awkward around kids, he’s going to show Jeff.

He plops himself right down on the carpet next to Billie and let’s her crawl the whole foot over to him. She tries climbing right into his lap and he catches her under the armpits as she squeals happily. Her smile only has no visible teeth and her eyes are just as dark as Jeff’s and Kent thinks he knows how people get attached to babies now.

He puts his legs out and lays her flat on them, doing what he’s seen his sister do to his nieces and nephews a million times before, pulling her up and then laying her back down quickly in a swinging motion that makes her laugh happily and kick her feet. See, Kent has this whole baby thing down, that’ll show Jeff.

He turns to tell Jeff as much. Maybe tease him that his kid loves Kent, and how Kent is good at everything. But when he looks over Jeff has this weird look on his face that he can’t quite place and the words die on his tongue as he continues the mindless swinging motion that Billie seems to love so much. He can feel his face grow a little warm.

Kent manages to get out a, “see, told you she’d love me. Literally no one is immune to the Parser charm,” before turning back to Billie, now bouncing her up and down on his legs which she seems to find equally appeasing.

Jeff is quiet, but Kent still hears the, “I guess not.” Jeff let’s out in a tone Kent doesn’t want to think too much about.

But he spends the next three hours hanging out with his teammate who seems to like him at the very least and a baby who seems to enjoy his company and that’s good enough for him.


	2. Chapter 2

“You have my number right?”

“Yes Swoops, I have your number.”

“And you know the number of the restaurant we’re going to?”

Kent rolls his eyes, hiking Billie higher up on his hip. She’s chewing on a set of fake toy keys that Kent got her. His mom said he used to have a set like it when he was younger that he was obsessed with. She’s gurgling happily, her other hand holding on to Kent’s shirt tightly. Kent sort of loves her. She’s the best ever. 

“Jeff, I know where you’re going. I know when you’re going to be there. I have very explicit instructions written out for me for every single possible situation that could arise. Billie and I are going to be just fine, and if something happens you are going to be the first person I call.”

Jeff looks like he wants to hesitate, maybe write five more pages of typed instructions for Kent. Kent wants him to hesitate. Wants him to maybe not go at all because Kent is selfish and Jeff is one of the best friends he’s had this past year and of course Kent had to go and catch feelings when he’s not even over his… whatever Jack is. Eventually Jeff just sighs, leans in and kisses Billie on the top of her curly head, smiles at Kent and closes the door softly behind him.

The season is over, it’s June, and Kent is going to be 19 in July and Billie is turning one in August and Kent can’t believe he volunteered to watch a one year old just because he has a crush on her dad. Okay, that isn’t the only reason. Billie is like the greatest one year old he knows, but he’s still never baby sat anyone under the age of 10 before so he’s hoping he doesn’t mess this up.

* * *

Which of course no longer than 30 minutes later he messes it up. Billie is crying, inconsolable and Kent has no idea what to do. He’s tried giving her dinner, which she wasn’t interested in, he made sure she didn’t need changed, she hadn’t bumped her head on anything, and Kent had been making funny faces and bouncing her for the last ten minutes and nothing.

Jeff would want him to call him. He wouldn’t want Kent to be overwhelmed with a one year old, but this isn’t exactly an emergency and Kent doesn’t want to call him off of his… his date unless something is actually wrong more than Kent just being a horrible babysitter. So he does the next best thing and he calls Brownie.

“Did you change her?” Harris Browning is 25 years old, and maybe shouldn’t have been the first person Kent called.

“No, but I checked and she doesn’t need changed?”

“Is she hungry or something? Isn’t it like always one of three things with babies? Hungry, tired, or diaper change?”

“If I had any clue, I wouldn’t be calling you!” Kent hisses into the phone, Billie still sniffling, her head pushed into the crook of Kent’s neck.

Brownie just sighs and Kent can hear some jingling from his end of the phone, “I’m coming over. We’ll figure something out right?”

Kent doesn’t sigh in relief, but it’s close.

* * *

When Brownie shows up he isn’t alone. Ellis Carr, who the team calls Beans for reasons Kent still isn’t sure about, is with him. Beans is only a year older than Kent, and he’s the one Kent is closest to on the team after Brownie and Jeff, so he isn’t upset to see him. More hands means more help or something like that.

When they get there about 15 minutes after Kent’s call, Billie is still crying. It’s not the wailing it was at the beginning, but tears are still running down her face and she’s still clutching on to Kent like she’s hurt or sick. Brownie immediately tries to make funny faces and noises at her like Kent had tried, maybe hoping to cheer her up, but she just hides her face further into Kent’s neck.

Brownie looks just as upset as Kent did when he realized that wasn’t going to help.

“I told you!” Kent groaned, “nothing is working.”

Beans reaches out and takes Billie gently from Kent’s arms and holds her so that he can look at his face. He pokes one of his fingers in her mouth, running it around her gums, “does she have any teething stuff?” He asks.

“I… I have no idea. What would that even look like?” Kent asks.

Beans just ignores him and walks into Jeff’s kitchen, still letting Billie mouth at his finger like it’s a chew toy. He opens the freezer and roots around in there for a second before coming back out with a small toy shaped like a slice of watermelon. Billie sees it and lets go of Beans’ finger and reaches for it. Beans hands it over, and Billie is shoving it in her mouth, chewing on it, and it’s the first time she’s been quiet in the last half hour.

“Holy shit dude, what did you do?” Brownie is asking, his brown eyes widening in surprise and what looks like awe.

“She’s teething? Her gums probably hurt a lot.” Beans says it like it should have been the easiest thing to figure out.

“I don’t know dude, I would have never figured that out. Are you like the baby whisperer? Maybe we should change your nickname or something.”

Beans shrugs, “I have four younger siblings, I’m used to it.” Beans passes Billie back over to Kent as she’s reaching for him with the hand that isn’t holding on to the watermelon piece.

Kent takes her gratefully. She isn’t his kid, and he’s only been here a little under a year, but for some reason he feels like he’s especially close to the little girl, “there, all better now, huh? You didn’t need to give me a tough time about it. God, I can’t wait until you can like talk and ask for what you want with more than pointing.” Brownie is laughing at the cooing tone Kent is using, but he doesn’t even care.

“So,” Brownie says as the three of them make their way back into the living room to sit on the couch, “you’re totally ordering us pizza right? Since we like came and saved you?”

Kent scoffs, “I’m ordering Beans pizza, you’re going to have to fend for yourself.” 

* * *

Kent wakes up when he hears the front door of the apartment open. He’s still in the armchair next to Billie’s crib, having fallen asleep there after putting Billie down to sleep about an hour ago. The armchair is one of the most comfortable things he’s ever slept in so Kent doesn’t think he messed up his back sleeping up like that. He figures Beans and Brownie probably just woke up after their junk food fest and decided to go home, but a few minutes later Jeff is coming through the door of Billie’s room.

He sees Kent curled up in the chair, covered with one of Billie’s quilts, and leans against the side of the door. Kent thinks it’s completely unfair that he’s so attractive. He smiles at him though, and like a total idiot waves at him, like he didn’t already know he was there or something. Jeff pushes off of the door and comes over to stand next to Billie’s crib, peering over the side and brushing a curly lock of brown hair out of her face.

“So I see you had two helpers come over. Beans and Brownie are sprawled all over my couch.” Jeff is smiling though so Kent knows he isn’t mad about Brownie and Beans coming over.

“Yeah, they were a big help,” Kent scoffs and rolls his eyes, but he’s smiling jokingly at the same time, “then Brownie made me buy him pizza even though Beans is the one who is like a total baby whisperer or something.”

Jeff looks a little worried about that, “did something happen? Kent I told you to call me if-”

Kent holds up his hand to cut Jeff off, “Dude it was totally okay. She wasn’t hurt or running a fever or anything. Just really fussy. She calmed down as soon as Beans realized she was teething. She chewed the hell out of that watermelon thing and was fine the rest of the night. I didn’t want to call you away from your date.”

Jeff looks at him for a moment and then sighs, “Sorry, I didn’t mean to get snippy.”

“It’s fine dude. It’s your kid of course you’re going to worry,” Kent isn’t sure he wants to ask the question on the tip of his tongue, but he does anyways, “how was your date by the way?”

Jeff rolls his eyes, “it was going great for the first hour and a half and then she saw the picture of Billie I had as my phone screen. Apparently she doesn’t like children.”

Kent scrunches his nose, “she doesn’t want children?”

“No, she doesn’t like them. Said straight to my face that they thought they were a waste of resources or something. I don’t know I stopped listening after ‘I don’t like kids’” Kent notices for the first time since Jeff has come in that he looks tired. 

“Well she sucks then. She does know she was like… also a kid at some point right?”

Jeff just lets out a snort of laughter at that, “I guess not.”

“Well…” Kent starts out, and he isn’t sure if this is giving away too much, if this is crossing some sort of line, “Billie is the best kid ever and if there’s someone who doesn’t like her, they’re obviously wrong.”

Jeff turns and smiles at Kent, and Kent knows he is well and truly fucked.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As promised, here's part three! I honestly don't know how many chapters there's going to be of this.  
> As of right now I'm planning on making it anywhere between 15 and 20, but we'll see.  
> Anyways enjoy!!

The thing with Jeff has only been building and building all summer. Kent thought he would have the rest of the off season at home with his Dad and occasionally older sister to get over the whole hot teammate with a baby thing. Except he spent the whole rest of the summer looking at pictures of Jeff and Billie together at the zoo, at the park having a picnic, swimming at the private pool most of the aces belonged to, and the worst one was the picture Jeff had sent him of the two of them on a hike up in Alberta. Billie was in one of those little slings, her face just visible over Jeff’s shoulder. She was laughing about something, cheesing for the camera as Jeff took a selfie of the two of them. It was adorable. Kent hated it. 

So, he had tried to get over his big stupid crush. He tried really hard okay? But when the guy kept sending him pictures that would make even the hardest of hearts melt, he didn’t really have a chance. His plans of “Getting Over This Dumb Crush” for the summer had extended into September, and then October, and then through November and December as well. It was already half way through the new year and Kent wasn’t having any more luck than he had when he first decided to do something about it. 

Jeff had maybe started to realize that something was up. Kent had been avoiding him a little more at the arena recently, if he asked him to come over after practice Kent normally had something super important to do. Which is how he ended up making one of those split-second decisions you aren’t supposed to make. The ones that you’re supposed to think about and plan months before you actually do it. But he had started running out of excuses not to hang out with Jeff and Billie any more and so he blurted the first thing out that came to mind when Jeff asked him if he wanted to go to the park with them after practicing that day. 

“I’m getting a cat!” 

Jeff just stands there and stares at him before he finally responds, “a cat? Since when have you been getting a cat? Not that I’m judging or anything, it’s just you haven’t said anything before now?” 

“I… well I thought the guys would make fun of me for getting a cat instead of a dog?” That sounds at least somewhat like something that Kent might be worried about, right? 

Jeff just scoffs, “please, you don’t give a single damn about what any of those losers thinks about you. Otherwise you wouldn’t open your mouth ever.” Jeff smiles, the chirp is good natured, so Kent doesn’t blink an eye at it. 

“Okay yeah, but I don’t want to hear the endless pussy jokes you know are going to come from that.”

The look that crosses over Jeff’s face is so close to disgust that Kent has to stop himself from laughing at him, “that’s a good point. So, we don’t tell any of them. Where are you getting the cat from?” 

“Uh… just from the humane society?” Kent knows where the one in Vegas is, he visits the website to look at the cats when he’s sad sometimes and his phone calls aren’t being returned. 

“Cool. You mind if Billie and I come along with you? She’s crazy about cats,” Kent is about to say no he read somewhere that you should only introduce one person to a cat at a time, but then Jeff says, “plus she’s really missed you. She keeps asking for you.”

And Kent can’t really say no to that can he? What type of person would he be if he said no when a almost two-year-old kept asking to see him? So of course, he caves, “yeah actually… yeah that sounds good. I’ll pick you two up in like half an hour?” 

“Yeah dude, sounds good.” Jeff smiles at him brightly, claps him on the shoulder, and then walks away towards his car. 

Kent can’t believe how stupid he is. 

****

 

When he picks Billie and Jeff up about forty minutes later, Billie comes running out the front door ahead of Jeff to Kent’s car. She’s wrapped around his legs in a second yelling “Up! Kenny, up!” at him. Kent obliges, as one does when an up is being requested, and hoists Billie up to settle against his hip. Her head is laying down across his collar bone as soon as she’s settled there and her hand grabs a fistful of his shirt, just holding on to him. 

Jeff is right behind her, car seat in tow. He smiles at Kent before opening the back door of his car and hooking the car seat so quickly it can only be attributed to the thousands of times he’s had to do it before. In seconds the car seat is hooked in and secured, and Jeff is reaching out for Billie to strap her in. Before he can grab her though she’s yelling at him. 

“No! Kenny!” Jeff rolls his eyes. 

“I can’t help it my talents are in high demand Jeffery.” Kent teases as he walks around him to settle Billie into her car seat. She seems happy with this and talks in gibberish while Kent is strapping her in. He tests the belts to make sure everything is secure and then shuts the door before getting in the driver’s seat. 

Jeff is already buckled in the passenger’s seat, and he’s giving Kent this weird look when he’s getting buckled but doesn’t really say anything. The ride over to the shelter is pretty quite other than Jeff and Kent taking turns responding to Billie’s nonsense sentences with “Oh yeah? Really?” every couple of minutes. It doesn’t take them long before they’re there, and Billie is being hoisted out of her car seat by Jeff and the three of them are making their way into the animal shelter together. 

Kent hates how domestic the whole thing feels. He hates how guilty it makes him feel that he likes it. This isn’t who he was supposed to be with like this but… but he can’t bring himself to be as guilty as he thinks he should. Kent shakes his head a little bit, as though that would get the thoughts out of his head. Jeff is looking at him, a different look than from in the car, worried almost. Kent just flashes a smile at him and they make their way to the front desk. 

The woman there is wearing purple scrubs with little paw prints on them. She looks up and smiles wide, “hey there! What can I help you with?” 

“I called a while ago,” he didn’t, he just wants to seem like he thought about this, like he was responsible, in front of Jeff, “about adopting a cat? I thought today might be the day?” 

The woman looks positively ecstatic about that. Kent doesn’t blame her. He’s sure there are lots of animals that don’t have homes at the center. She talks to him about policies and paperwork for a while and Jeff is over on the other side of the room showing Billie the wall of pictures of animals that have been adopted from the center that year. Billie is pointing and laughing at some of them. It makes Kent smile. Before long he’s finished with what seems like the pages and pages of paper work he has to fill out before even going into the back of the center to see the cats. 

Jeff and Billie join him for this part and walk back with Kent and the woman (Charlotte her name tag says) as she talks to them, “It’s just so nice to see one of the cats getting taken home today. Not that there’s anything wrong with them, it’s just that the dogs go so much more.” 

“Really?” Jeff asks, “I thought people would assume cats were less responsibility and adopt them more?” 

Charlotte sighs, “well that’s true of a lot of singles adopting out. But it seems like families always want a dog? Probably something to do with the stereotypical family dynamic. You know 2.5 kids, golden retriever. That kind of thing.” 

If Kent had been drinking anything when Charlotte told them that, he might have spit it on the floor. She thought they were a couple. She thought they were a family. She definitely said, ‘most families.’ Kent wondered if he should correct her. Jeff didn’t seem bothered by it at all, and Kent felt like if he said something now it would just look like he was trying to ‘no homo’ his cat’s adoption. So he decided to just think about it on repeat at high speed for the next 15 seconds it took them to get to the cat room instead. 

“Alright, so the cats in this room are mostly younger. It is a free roaming room so none of the cats are in cages. You can go ahead in and spend as much time as you’d like. If you all find a cat you make a connection to, just come back up front and get me and we can take care of everything else! Congratulations on the pet adoption!” She’s smiling at them and then turning around and heading back up front.

When she’s rounded the corner and completely out of ear shot Jeff chuckles a little bit, “I think she thinks we might be married.” 

Kent let out a little sigh of relief, “okay, so it wasn’t just me! Pretty dumb huh.” He’s trying to play it off, like it’s no big deal but the look on Jeff’s face… he doesn’t know what it is, just knows that that wasn’t the right thing to say, “I mean I am definitely too good looking for you.” 

That gets a better reaction out of Jeff, a genuine laugh, “sure Parse, keep telling yourself that. We all know Billie is the prettiest in this room. Huh Billie?” Jeff bounces her a little and she smiles.

Kent just watches them fondly for a second before turning back to the cat room door, “okay, ready for this?” 

“Shouldn’t I be asking you that?” But Jeff and Billie are following him into the room anyways. 

Kent is a little overwhelmed and a little in heaven. The room isn’t ginormous, but it isn’t tiny either. There are cat towers and boxes and little jingle bells littering the floor of the room. There’re feather toys and crumpled up paper and about ten cats in the room that seem to be batting at every single thing on the ground at the same time. It’s probably one of the best things Kent has ever gotten to do, standing in this room. 

“So how do we do this?” Jeff asks, eyeing all the cats running around. 

“I think… I think maybe we just sit and see if one of them comes to us?” Kent isn’t really sure either. 

But that’s what they do. Jeff sits down, and Billie is on his lap, watching the cats play with the most attention Kent thinks he’s ever seen any two-year-old give anything. Her eyes are tracking a couple of the cats swatting feathers back and forth and the absolutely delighted smile on her face is making Kent a little fuzzy. He isn’t even paying attention to what cat is catching his eye because he’s too busy watching her.

One of the kittens that Billie was watching swat at the feather toy has stopped. It’s attention completely on Billie and Jeff. It takes a moment to roll up onto its feet but it’s making its way over to the three of them and in seconds is butting its head against Jeff’s knee. Billie is reaching out with her hands to try and grab its black fur. 

“Gentle touches Billie.” Jeff says quietly, and the toddler huffs a little, but she reaches out slower and puts her open palm gently on the kitten’s back and just lets it sit there. 

To the cat’s credit, it doesn’t seem to mind the extra weight of a toddler hand at all and just flops back down on its side in front of them, its eyes closing in contentment, Kent hopes, instead of some kind of murderous cat rage. Kent watches them for a moment, Billie content with just letting her hand rest there while she smiles like a maniac. He reaches out finally and lets his hand rest right in front of the kitten’s face so that it can smell his hand first, which is does. 

The cat is up on its feet again and making the few steps over to Kent before flopping down in front of him instead and rolling over to show its white belly. Kent gets a better look at it now that its right in front of him. It’s pretty large as far as a kitten goes so it must be on the older side of young. Its coat is long black. There are three white paws, the fourth still completely black. It looks like its wearing a white scarf around its neck, the rest of its face completely black. It’s a pretty cute fucking cat. 

Kent looks back over to Billie and Jeff. Billie is still paying attention to this one specific cat, not even giving a single hell about the other kittens that are currently butting into Jeff’s knees or circling around them. Her hand is stretched out far enough that she can pet its tail, gentle touches like Jeff had told her. 

“Daddy, kitty.” Billie says quietly, like she’s trying to use gentle words too. 

“I know sweetheart, its pretty sweet huh?” 

Billie just nods her head, even if Kent isn’t 100% sure that she knows what Jeff was saying to her. Kent looks up and meets Jeff’s eyes. They smile a little at each other over the cat and Kent thinks even if he didn’t interact with any of the other cats a lot there is absolutely no way he can get any other cat than this one. It has to be this one. He says as much to Jeff who laughs. 

“Don’t let her pick for you. I’m not sure why she’s so obsessed with this one.” 

“Nah it’s okay. Look it’s like the chilliest cat ever.” 

“Hey, you know what they say, opposites attract.” 

“I cannot believe you’re chirping me to hell and back in front of my new fluffy child Jeff.” Kent mocks hurt but is quickly laughing. 

“Language Kent. But I think this is a good choice. It seems to like you a lot. I’ll go get Charlotte and we can do all of the other boring paperwork.” 

“Yeah that sounds good.” Kent watches Jeff stand up with Billie and slip out of the room without letting any of the other kitten out with him.

The kitten is climbing into his lap now, stretched out between his folded legs. In seconds its eyes are closed, and Kent can feel as much as he can hear the deep rattling purr that the cat is giving off. It’s comforting, and Kent is glad he’s getting a little bit of alone time with the cat right now. He has a feeling he’s going to need comforting a lot this year.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So if you all noticed the tags on this fic changed a little bit. There's going to be some canon divergence in chapter 6 I believe (maybe chapter five if chapter five is as long as chapter four?)   
> Also, I went back and edited the first three chapters because I realize I accidentally made Billie a little older than I had meant for her to be whoops. So nothing really has changed other than that so don't feel the need to go back and reread them if you don't want to! 
> 
> This chapter is where the angst part of the fluff/angst tag comes in. The next couple of chapters are going to be a little sad. Also you'll notice that this chapter is a lot longer than the normal chapters are. I tried splitting it in two, but unfortunately there just wasn't a good spot to do it. Chapters from now on may be a little longer than they used to be. 
> 
> Anyways, enjoy reading and let me know what you think!!

It’s the September before Kent’s third season in the NHL. Training camps have been going on for a while. They’re doing their public training camp sessions next weekend and Kent still gets nervous about fans watching every day practices. He can’t help but to worry he’s going to screw up somehow and it’s going to get plastered all over the internet. Or he’s going to be staring at Jeff like the idiot he is and that’s going to get posted on the internet. Which would be much worse Kent thinks. There were already rumors about him and Jack when they were playing for Rimouski, Kent doesn’t want to know what it’s like when you’re playing in the NHL. 

But regardless of all his uneasiness with the upcoming open training camp sessions, trying to navigate around his feelings for Jeff, and trying to still get a call or text back from Zimms so that they can finally talk through shit he feels good about this year. He’s no longer a teenager and for some reason that feels significant. Mostly because he feels like an actual adult now. An actual adult whom a certain 22-year-old might think could be a stable responsible influence on their newly turned two-year-old. 

Which is… okay he doesn’t want to think about that right now because every time he does, he feels a little weirded out that he cares so much. Then he has to think about why he cares so much, and he gets dangerously close to admitting that he likes Jeff. Like… likes him. A lot. He’s about to spiral into one of his weird moods that he has no idea how to get out of when Jeff comes sliding across the ice out of no where and bumps him into the boards. 

“What the hell was that for dude?” 

Jeff just grins at him, “I like seeing your affronted face when I do that. You look like Kit when you pick her up off a pile of your warm clothes.” 

Kent’s face scrunches up as he whacks at Jeff’s shin pads with his stick hard enough that he can feel it but not hard enough to hurt, “I do not look like that.” 

“Kent you’re literally scrunching your face up like that right now. You are honestly terrible, you know that right?” 

“Was there a reason you came over on my side of the ice to bother me? Aren’t you supposed to be running drills over there?” Kent stops the urge to stick his tongue out. 

“Yeah. You wanna hang out with Bille tonight? I have to run and do some stuff and it’s not really baby friendly.” 

Kent has no idea what that means so he decides to go the route of pretending to needle Jeff about dates, “you got a hot date you’re planning on being out late with.” Kent wiggles his eyebrows at him and he hopes his voice is teasing enough that he doesn’t give away just how much he hopes that isn’t the answer. 

Jeff, for his part, just rolls his eyes like he always does when Kent says something mildly stupid, “no, but I have been thinking about buying a house recently and my realtor has some really weird hours.” 

“Oh shit. You’re buying a house? Like a real one?” 

“Been thinking about it, yeah. I don’t know. Just singed that extension and if I’m going to be here five more years, I think I wouldn’t mind moving Billie and I into some place bigger. Homier.” 

Kent literally has more money than he knows what to do with (actually he has people who tell him what to do with his money) but for some reason even to him the thought of buying a house terrifies him. He thinks this is just one more way that Jeff is an “Adult” who is woefully aware of Kent’s immaturity. Maybe that’s why he always agrees to babysitting Billie when Jeff asks if he’s up for it. Because every time Jeff comes home, and Billie is not only perfectly okay but genuinely happy it gives Kent ‘adult’ points. 

“I can hang out with Billie tonight dude. You never have to ask.” 

Jeff looks like he’s trying to think of what to say for a moment, “well I never know if you have anything planned you know?” He smiles at him, “If the general public knew that you never dated, I think the internet would implode.” 

Kent scoffs and fiddles with the tape on his stick for something to do. It’s not that he doesn’t… well okay that’s exactly it. He never dates. His publicist and the Aces PR people used to be happy about it. His party boy reputation when he had first signed was apparently all anyone ever talked about around the Aces facility. He goes out with the team of course, but he’s not dumb. He’s never caught on camera drinking or getting pictures grinding up on a new girl every other night. Now though, Bea, his publicist has started begging him to go on dates and let his picture get taken so he doesn’t look like a shut in. 

Jeff doesn’t know why he doesn’t date anyone. Doesn’t know that the thought of it makes him feel insanely guilty even though Jack hasn’t talked to him more than three or four texts in nearly three years. Jack made his position on their “relationship” perfectly clear and Kent’s not going to mess with that but… every time he thinks about Jeff in a way that’s more than friendly it feels like cheating. He doesn’t date because he doesn’t know how to move on or something. At least that’s what he thinks his sister would tell him. 

“I don’t date because every time I show up to one they are so baffled and intimidated by my raw beauty that they can’t even look at me.” 

Jeff just sighs and Kent has no idea what that’s about, “yeah that’s totally it.” 

Kent can feel the silence stretch between them. They type that makes you want to say absolutely anything just to cut the tension that builds because of it, “what time do you want me to be over there for Billie?” 

“Does 6 work?”

“For Billie, anytime works. That kid loves me. Like unconditionally. It’s great for my ego.” Kent grins trying not to let the silence settle over them again. 

“Yeah she does love you,” and it’s when Jeff says shit like that that makes Kent’s heart race just a little and he has to remind himself that it’s nothing, “you’re right though, it’s terrible for your ego. I should tell her to cry all night to bring you down a peg.” 

“She would never betray me like that so keep dreaming.” Kent flashes a grin, taps Jeff’s shins with his stick again before skating off to skate more drills. 

***

Sometimes it amazes Kent that Jeff lets him be totally responsible for his two-year-old daughter for extended periods at a time without any other kind of supervision. Like the trust he has in him honestly blows his mind. Which is why when he goes over to stay with Billie tonight, he doesn’t think anything is going to be any different. He’s going to stay in with her like normal (he doesn’t trust himself to take her to a park or anything yet) he bought her this paint for her second birthday made completely of vegetables, so they don’t have to worry about her eating, so he thinks he’ll paint with her tonight. Maybe watch a movie together before he puts her to bed. 

Except it doesn’t go the same as it always does. Kent is in the kitchen with Billie standing by his feet, holding on to his pant leg while he makes her a snack before they settle down on the couch to watch Brother Bear. When he hears the knock-on Jeff’s front door, he bends down to pick up Billie and carries her to the front door with him. He had invited Brownie over to watch Brother Bear with them and then eat their weight in pizza once she was asleep. 

“We almost started Brother Bear without you-“ he’s saying as he opens the door. 

Except Brownie isn’t on the other side door. It’s a woman. She’s pretty young from what Kent can tell, either his age or a little older. Her dark curly hair is tied back in one of those buns that looks effortless, but Kent’s sister keeps telling him takes like forty minutes. She looks like a normal early twenty something, but Kent gets this weight right in the pit of his stomach because she looks like Billie. Or he guesses Billie looks exactly like her. 

Kent instinctively holds Billie closer to him, shifts himself so that the hip he’s holding Billie on is turned away from the door, his hand goes to the back of her head and holds her closer to his shoulder, “can I help you?” His voice sounds like its shaking and he hates it. 

“Is Jeff home?” She looks like she’s trying to look further into the apartment, but Kent nudges the door a little bit with his foot, so her view is blocked just a little more. 

“No but he’ll be right back. He just went out for a couple of minutes.” Of course he’s lying but she doesn’t know that. 

The woman is trying to catch a better glimpse of Billie now, “Can I see he-“ 

“No.” Kent says immediately and he goes to close the door but she has her hand on it a second later, not pushing but holding it open. 

“Listen I didn’t… I’m not trying to…” she pauses, eyeing him up and down a little, “are you his new boyfriend?” 

Kent freezes. His entire body is probably ram rod straight right now. He can hear Billie talking to him, but it’s sounding like a whole bunch of buzzing right now. He needs to say something or do something or maybe if he’s lucky he’ll wake up in two seconds and realize that this was all a dream or he’s getting his wisdom teeth pulled and it’s a hallucination. But she’s still staring at him and he still looks like a deer in the headlights, so he knows it isn’t a hallucination, unfortunately. 

“I don’t think Jeff’s personal life is any of your damn business,” he’ll have to put a dollar in the swear jar latter, “who are you anyways?” Kent is absolutely positive who she is but maybe if he plays dumb it’ll help. 

“I’m just the last person Jeff decided to abandon. I’m sure he’s told you all about it.” She looks absolutely vicious now and Kent really doesn’t think he can handle this whole discussion any longer, “Listen, I’m here because I want to see my daughter. I don’t care about outing two NHL players right now, so you can stop looking like you’re about to vomit. But there isn’t much I wouldn’t do to get my daughter back, so you can think on that.” 

Kent is about to tell her she can go fuck herself, put another dollar in the swear jar, and slam the door in her face but suddenly Brownie is towering right behind her, “excuse me ma’am, this is my friend’s apartment, can I get through please?” He sounds completely polite, but his face is expressing the fact that he’s heard at least the last minute of conversation. 

The woman, Kent doesn’t even know her name, backs up and out of Brownie’s way, “tell Jeff I’ll be back.” She tries to steal another glance at Billie but Kent has stepped aside so she’s 100% out of view. She’s down the hallway and out of sight a minute later. 

Kent steps back so that Brownie can enter the apartment completely and he shuts the door a little too harshly because suddenly Billie is sniffling into his shoulder. She could probably tell that something wasn’t right. That Kent was on edge, that the woman was upset. The raised voices and the slammed door probably didn’t do anything to calm her down. She keeps up a quiet mantra of “Kenny” and “want daddy” mumbled into his shoulder.

“It’s okay Billie. Kenny’s really sorry he slammed the door. That wasn’t very nice of him was it?” 

“No.” she says, and Kent almost laughs because she never lets him off the hook. 

He’s about to suggest that they go watch Brother Bear to cheer her up, but she’s already looking tired and nodding off in his arms. It’s only about an hour before she normally goes down anyways so he figures it’s okay if she nods off early tonight. He gives Brownie a ‘wait here’ look and he’s off down the hallway taking her to her room. Normally he’d sit in the armchair next to her crib with her and read a story or pat her back while whispering to her quietly while she fell asleep, but she’s already out by the time they get there. He’s suddenly thankful he put her in PJs before now. 

He leans over her crib and sets her down gently, covering her up. He pulls his phone out of his pocket and hits dial on Jeff’s name. It goes immediately to voicemail. Jeff is normally really good about keeping his phone on him and loud when Kent has Billie, but he must have accidentally let it die. Kent waits for the whole voicemail schtick to go by. 

“Billie is okay, but you need to come home now. Some lady showed up at the apartment and I… Jeff she… you just need to come home okay?” 

Kent stands in the middle of Billie’s room for a moment, just staring at his black phone screen before finally pocketing it. He looks over the side of the crib to make sure Billie is sound asleep one more time and then he leaves the room, making sure to leave the door cracked a little. When he gets back to the living room Brownie is sitting on the couch, head bent looking at his own phone. When he hears Kent enter, he stuffs his phone in his pocket and scoots over on the couch. He pats the cushion next to him and Kent sits. 

As soon as his butt is on the cushion it’s like every single bit of tension and stress and volatile emotion that had been built up in the surprise visit is suddenly leeching out of him. He’s got his elbows on his knees and his head hanging, hands linked together on the back of his neck. He feels so damn tired he doesn’t know what he’s going to do. He doesn’t even know how to start the conversation of what the hell it was Brownie walking in on anyways. 

“Dude are you okay?” 

“Do I fucking look okay?” Kent asks just on the wrong side of upset. He picks his head up and looks at Brownie, “I’m sorry, I’m just… I don’t know.” He feels strung out. Like he’s about to cry and wants to smash something. He hasn’t felt this bad since right before the draft. 

Brownie looks at him for a moment and then sighs, “I just… I want you to know, so that it doesn’t seem like I’m trying to hide anything that I heard the last part of the conversation.” 

He says it subtly enough that Kent thinks he’s going to able to play dumb and Brownie will get the hint, “you mean how I’m a huge homosexual?” okay or not. 

To his credit Brownie doesn’t look upset by the statement, maybe more annoyed by Kent’s outburst, but he’s used to those by now, “you don’t have to say anything to me if you don’t want to but… I want you to know that I don’t care.” 

“That’s what everyone says.” 

“And I mean it! Kent, dude. You’ve known me for years now. You’re literally my best friend okay? Before you got to this team, I wasn’t… I didn’t really fit in with any other group of dudes. It was like everyone already had their cliques and best friends sorted out and Beans was still so quiet all the time he didn’t hang out with anyone like ever. I was seriously lonely,” he’s running a hand through his curly red hair and making it stand on end which Kent would normally chirp him about, “I know… okay I don’t know personally but I’ve seen how shitty locker rooms can be and I… I don’t ever want you to think I would ever treat you that way. You’re my best friend.” 

“I think you said that already.” Kent chirps weakly. It isn’t his best but he’s trying to steer this conversation away from serious and into something he can handle. 

“Well it’s true so.” He shrugs, “hey is it okay if I give you a hug or?” 

“Well I am your best friend so,” Kent smiles at him, “I mean you were totally lost and helpless without me. Lonely as fuck. It’s a good thing I’m here otherwise you’d have no friends.” 

Brownie punches him in the shoulder gently, “you are such an asshole oh my god.” But he’s leaning across the couch to crush Kent in a hug anyways. Kent just lets his arms hang loose at this side, but it feels nice anyways. 

“That’s part of my charm, right? I mean it’s why you wanted so desperately to be my best friend.” Kent says when Brownie lets him go. 

“That’s it. I’m literally never telling you anything important ever again.” 

Kent just scoffs, but the conversation quiets down after that. Kent can tell there’s something Brownie really wants to ask, he’s always asking questions, but he can also tell he’s trying really hard not to, “Jesus just ask whatever it is you’re making my head hurt.” 

Brownie looks relieved, “are you and Jeff actually together?” and then he looks a little constipated that he just shouted it out like that instead of finding a way to be subtle. 

Kent grimaces, “no we aren’t. Jeff isn’t gay.” 

Brownie has a quick confused expression passing over his face, “not to like… argue about this but like… she seemed pretty sure that you two were a thing. Like definite.” 

“Well we’re not! Jesus stop asking man, it’s not… we’re not… and even if he was I wouldn’t.” Kent is on his feet now, pacing.

He hates this. He absolutely fucking hates it. He never had any plan on coming out to any of his teammates any time soon. Not even Jeff, and that lady whatever the hell her name is, took that from him. He doesn’t get it back. He wants to throw something, a glass at a wall maybe. He wants to stop being famous for a minute. He wants to talk to Jack more than he ever has in the last couple of years combined. He wants to cry. The last one he can do easily and without destroying something in Jeff’s apartment or getting ignored again so he does that. 

Brownie doesn’t say anything, just looks down at his feet for which Kent is thankful. He doesn’t think he could stand someone looking at him right now, “what do I do?” he asks suddenly. 

Brownie looks up then, looks awkward about seeing the tears fall freely from Kent’s eyes but he doesn’t comment on that, “In what way?” 

“What do I… now that people know. I don’t know what to do.” 

Brownie heaves out a sigh, “I don’t really think I can give you any advice on that. It’s not… I have no clue Kent. I mean whether you decide to tell management or the team?”

“Do you think I should?” He’s still pacing, he’s going to put a hole in Jeff’s carpet. 

“I think when it comes to the team and management you should do whatever the hell you want. They don’t have to know, and you shouldn’t tell them if you don’t want to but… Kent she was saying stuff about Jeff too, I think… I think you should talk to him about it? It’s only fair to warn him about what she said so he… if he has something to worry about, he knows about it ahead of time.”

Kent hates that he’s right, “this is so fucked up.” He finally sits down again, still next to Brownie. 

“Let’s order that pizza and watch Brother Bear like we planned. I know… I know you won’t be able to stop thinking about it. But at least we can do something to distract you for a while, right?” 

Kent just nods and feels comforted a little when Brownie’s hand reaches out and pats his back. He should be thankful, he thinks. Brownie finding out about him went better than he could ever have hoped a teammate would take something like this. But he felt hollowed out. Like someone took a melon scoop to every single stable emotion he had been feeling up to this point. He grabbed a blanket off the back of the couch and covered himself with it while Brownie popped the Brother Bear disc into the Blu-ray player and started ordering pizza online. 

They sat like that together, close enough that their knees knocked every so often if they shifted their weight. Kent couldn’t help but chirp Brownie over the parts he thought were sad. He almost nearly felt not as wrung out an hour in. Maybe he could even say he felt okay about the whole thing, marginally anyways. But then he heard the key turn in the lock of the front door and he remembered he was going to have to have this conversation with Jeff again in about three seconds and he didn’t know if he was going to be able to do it. 

He felt Brownie reach over and squeeze his hand gently before letting go, “do you want me to stay?” 

“I don’t know… maybe? Just for a little bit?” Brownie nodded and settled down back into the couch. The door swung open and the two of them heard Jeff before they saw him. 

“I am so sorry I am later than I thought I would be. I always assume there’s absolutely no traffic in Vegas for some reason when there absolutely always is. Plus, my realtor was like twenty minutes late to begin with. I was going to text you but I realized my phone died and I left my charger at home-“ Jeff rounded the corner from the front door and saw Kent and Brownie on the couch, Brownie still holding on to Kent’s hand in silent comfort and Kent probably looking strung out, “what the hell happened? Kent are you okay?” 

Kent couldn’t even speak, he just shook his head because he felt the burning of tears starting to make their way back to his face. Jeff was in the living room in seconds and his head was turning looking around the room. Probably wondering where Billie was. Kent realized he didn’t tell him that this wasn’t about Billie. Or at least not entirely. 

“Jeff, Billie is fine. She’s asleep in her room.” Brownie said, finally letting go of Kent’s hand. Kent used it to wipe the tears off of his face. 

Jeff looked more confused at that, “what the hell happened then?” 

“I… I had asked Brownie if he wanted to come over and watch a movie with Billie and I before I put her down for bed,” his voice was shaking, and he couldn’t help the involuntary quivering his lip was trying so hard to do. He’d always been a crier and he hated it, “someone was at the door and I thought it was Brownie, so I opened it without looking through the peep hole.” 

“Who was it?” Jeff asked, he had made his way over to the couch too and was sitting on the coffee table right in front of it, right in front of Kent. 

“Some lady. I didn’t recognize her but… after a while I knew who she was, and she said it too.” He sucked in some air to help him keep his voice steady, “I tried telling her to leave but then she was trying to see into the apartment and I went to close the door but she put her hand on it, so I couldn’t get it closed without slamming it on her hand. But then Brownie came and intimidated her into leaving a little bit. I swear to god Jeff if I had known who it was, I promise I wouldn’t have opened the door. I swear.” 

Jeff looked as about shell shocked as Kent felt in the moment, “I need you to leave.” 

That… that wasn’t what Kent thought was going to be the reaction, “what?” 

“I need you to leave please. You and Brownie need to go home. I need to… I need to be by myself right now please.” 

“Jeff she-“ 

“Kent, leave!” Jeff didn’t yell, but his voice was raised, and he sounded agitated, more than Kent had heard him sound before when it wasn’t something to do with a game. 

“Jeff…” Brownie started, he sounded almost like he was pleading with him on Kent’s behalf. 

“Brownie, I really appreciate you helping out and being here. But this is about me and my child and not about either of you right now. So, I need you both to grab your jackets and keys and get the hell out of my apartment. I don’t need you two here right now. I don’t need you.” 

I don’t need you. Kent had heard that before and it didn’t suck hearing it any less a second time around even if the situation was completely different. Even if he knew Jeff would see him the day after tomorrow anyways. Even if he knew Jeff asking them to leave him alone right now didn’t mean that he never wanted to see him again. Kent jerked himself off of the couch, reached around Jeff and grabbed his keys and wallet off of the coffee table. He tried not to look as visibly upset as he was, but he’d never been good at hiding his emotions. 

“Dude…” Brownie hissed at Jeff lowly. 

Kent didn’t know what the look on Jeff’s face was and he didn’t want to try and figure it out, “It’s fine Brownie,” he muttered, “Jeff doesn’t want us in his house, so we’ll get out of his house. This has nothing to do with us remember? Not like we aren’t his best friends. Not like that lady practically threatened me, threatened him too, but whatever. It’s fine he doesn’t want us here.” Kent was slipping his feet into his slides and heading to the front door. 

Jeff was on his feet though, reaching out and grabbing Kent’s wrist to stop him, “what do you mean threatened? She threatened you?” 

Kent jerked his arm out of Jeff’s grip, “It’s not about me remember? Jesus leave me the fuck alone.” 

Kent reached the door before Jeff could grab his arm again, or reach for him, or say anything that could make him stop. He remembered not to slam it behind him so he wouldn’t wake Billie up and then he was taking the steps two at a time down three flights of stairs to get to the bottom ground where the parking garage was connected to the apartment building. He pressed the unlock button on his key fob and threw himself into the front seat, slamming his door behind him. He stared straight ahead of him at a concrete divider before finally screaming as loud as he could, hitting the steering wheel a few times for good measure. 

Maybe one day he would learn his lesson about falling for pretty boys with dark hair.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> One of these days I'm going to be able to write something completely happy without any sort of angst but I guess today isn't that day.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You might have noticed there were tags added. Those are super important, you may want to read them!  
> Also you may have noticed that this chapter is a bit longer than the others. I couldn't fit everything into a short chapter, and it didn't feel right splitting the content of this chapter. I think it needed to all be together.  
> You also also may have noticed that the chapter count is higher?
> 
> Go to the end for notes on the chapter that contains spoilers.

Kent has been sitting in his apartment for two days without talking to anyone. He suddenly wishes that he still lived in Halvo’s house instead of on his own. It would make this a lot easier. It would make being alone, not seeing Jeff, a lot easier. He could call Brownie. He knows Brownie would be willing to come over without any questions asked, no matter what he was doing, but Kent doesn’t want to monopolize Brownie’s time away from his other friends on the team. Besides, he has Kit keeping him company. 

He turns over on his couch and grabs his phone, looking at the locked screen. He has a few texts from Brownie that he’ll answer later, a schedule reminder for practice in the morning, and a missed call from the Aces front offices. He hadn’t even heard his phone ring an hour ago when he supposedly got it. Kent sighs to himself and sits up to listen to the voicemail. 

It’s only a few seconds before he hears his AGM’s Meredith’s voice on the other end, “Hey Kent, this is Mer. I know we don’t have anything scheduled until tomorrow but if you could come in to the offices by seven pm today that would be wonderful. We’ll be here until then.” The line clicks dead and that’s it. 

Kent glances at the time on his phone and it’s only just turned three. He supposes he can get off of his ass and head in to see what Meredith and everyone else needs. He gives Kit a quick kiss to the top of her head before he’s leaving his apartment and heading into the rink. The drive in is always pretty relaxing to him anyways, so maybe it’ll do him some good. He doesn’t know. 

It only takes a short twenty minutes to get there with the traffic happening around him. When he walks in the back entrance he notices first, that it’s pretty dead inside. It’s Sunday, and no one is ever here on Sunday, so that makes sense. Then it hits him. No one is ever here on Sunday. No one is ever here on Sunday so why are they calling him in on a Sunday. Kent has had a lot of practice letting his mind race to the worst possible conclusion and all he can think about right now is that Billie’s mom followed through on her threat. That she somehow got ahold of management, told them what she knew. He’s getting traded. That’s the only possible reason he could be here right now. 

Kent can feel his heart beating so violently in his chest that his ears start ringing. He doesn’t even think he could hear anyone if they tried to talk to him right now. The car keys in his hands are being clutched so tightly that they’re probably pressing angry purple indents into the palm of his hands. As he walks down the halls to get to Meredith’s office, it feels like he’s marching to his own death. When he rounds the corner to where Meredith’s office is, the first thing he notices is that Halvo is sitting there. 

Shit. They even called Halvo in for this? Kent stops at the end of the hallway and just stares. Are they asking him if he noticed anything when they lived together? That’s illegal right? Kent really wants to turn around and walk out, to pretend like he never got Mer’s voicemail and then dodge her for the rest of his career if possible. Maybe find someone who looks just enough like him to take his place whenever she’s near. But Halvo looks up from the seat he’s sitting in outside of Mer’s office and waves at him. 

“Hey. Didn’t call us back. We weren’t sure if you’d make it.” Halvo’s Norwegian accent is still noticeable even after the decades he’s spent in the states for Juniors and the NHL, it calms Kent down.

“I uh… yeah. Forgot to call back. What is this all about anyways?” 

Halvo laughs, “You look so scared. Like a little rabbit. Calm down Kent. Nothing bad. I promise. Come on. I told Meredith I would wait out here for you.” He motions for Kent to walk the rest of the way down the hallway and stand with him. 

Halvo knocks on the door to Meredith’s office and a quiet, “come in!” is heard from the other side. Halvo pushes the door open, holds it for Kent to go in first. Meredith is sitting at her desk, dark brown hair pulled up high on her head. She isn’t wearing the business chic outfits she normally has on. She’s in jeans and an Aces sweater, Halvo’s if the big “C” on the front tells him anything. So this is a casual meeting. No one would trade him in street clothes right? 

Meredith smiles at him, her lips stretching across her face, showing perfect white teeth. She’s always been nicer than most Assistant General Managers Kent thinks he would find elsewhere in the NHL and he’s always been thankful for that. She motions to one of the plush chairs she has sitting in front of her desk for he and Halvo to take. Kent sits down, and he realizes he’s still clutching his keys tightly. He let’s go and gets some of the feeling back in his hand after having it tensed for so long. 

“So I’m sure you’re wondering why you’re here, if Halvo hasn’t told you already.” 

“My lips have been sealed.” Halvo says beside him. 

“I’m… yeah I thought I was getting traded at first.” Kent tries to make it sound like a joke, but the tone of his voice isn’t light enough for that. 

Meredith just laughs, “Oh Jesus. Kent why would you ever think we’d trade you? No, no. Don’t you notice anything? Anything new?” 

Kent takes a quick look around the office. Absolutely nothing has changed in here since the last time he’d been inside of it four days ago. He notices Meredith’s bun isn’t as big as normal so he guesses, “you got a haircut?” 

Meredith just laughs, “I did, two days ago thank you for noticing, but no. Did you notice anything about my sweater?”

And Kent looks at it again. It’s the normal home Jersey that they sell in the shop downstairs in the Arena. It’s black with the spade. Nothing he hasn’t seen before. Halvo sighs beside him, “I told you. He won’t notice. Head always in clouds.” Halvo smiles at him. 

“I thought we could give him a little more credit. Really Kent, I thought this whole thing out pretty well and you’re ruining my damn surprise.” She turns a bit in her chair and Kent can see the sides of her sleeves better now. 

They don’t have the 20 for Halvo’s jersey. They have a 90 on it. For Kent’s. They have a 90 on the sleeves and a big white “C” on the front. Kent’s mouth falls open and he stares ahead at the sleeves of Meredith’s new Ace’s sweater. The one where it says he’s captain. He whips his head around to look at Halvo who is smiling at him gently. The look on his face must be alarming because Halvo reaches out and ruffles his hair like he’s done since Kent was 18 and new to the Aces. 

“I’m retiring. We’re announcing it in a couple of days, before the first preseason game.” 

“Where we’ll also be announcing your captaincy.” Meredith tells him, the big smile still on her face. 

“I don’t… I don’t understand.” 

“Kent…” Meredith starts slowly, like she knows this needs to be explained to him, “we felt, the organization and even the players we subtly asked, that you were leadership material for this team. Halvo gave a glowing recommendation. We don’t want to be a team that remains captainless for years just because we can’t pick. And honestly… it wasn’t that hard to decide who we wanted in the first place. You have to have known that eventually the C would come to you?” 

“I didn’t… I didn’t realize that you all thought I was responsible enough? Or uh…” 

Kent is still not making sense. Seeing the C on a sweater with his number is making his heart do things. He’s always seen an A on his sweater but there’s never been a C. He never thought he would ever get that far. Jack was always going to be the one to captain Rimouski. There was never any doubt about it. Kent wouldn’t have wanted it over Jack anyways. But he never… he never thought that he would wear the C in the NHL either. Most guys went their entire careers without even an A. He’s having a hard time thinking about being mentioned when people talk about NHL captains with some of his heroes. 

Meredith just laughs again, “Kent this is the NHL. Of course responsibility is part of maintaining the C. You’re already the face of this franchise. But you’re the face and the leadership now too. It’s a big responsibility, of course it is. But if every team only picked captains based off of responsibility some teams would have different captains.” 

“Kent,” Halvo says calming and steady beside him, “do you want it?” 

Kent stares at him like he can’t believe that’s even a question. But he also can’t believe that he’s even sitting here thinking about it instead of saying yes, of course, immediately. He swallows around his dry throat, trying to come up with the words. He finds that he doesn’t have them, in the end. So he nods his head. The first nod is so small it probably looks like an involuntary twitch, so he nods it again, more jovially this time. 

“Yes. Yes I want it. I… I want it more than anything.” 

Meredith is practically beaming at him from across the desk. She reaches down and grabs something out of his line of sight. When her arms come back up she’s holding a jersey, in his size. With his number on it. With the C large and white and immovable on it’s chest. Kent reaches out his hands, and he feels like they’re shaking, and grabs the sweater from her. He holds it, clutches it tightly and thinks that he finally has something in his life he can hold on to. 

“You’re going to wear that to practice tomorrow. The team is going to find out that you’re captain tomorrow. We’re going to tell the media the day after with Halvo announcing his retirement at the same time. Okay?” 

“Yeah that… that sounds amazing. Okay. I’ll do that. I… thank you. Thank you so much. For having faith in me that I could do something like this. That I could… that I could make the Aces proud.” 

Meredith gets this soft look on her face. She reaches out her hand and squeezes Kent’s, “we always had faith in you Kent. It was always going to be you.” She doesn’t realize what those words mean to him though, because she’s already moving on while he feels like he’s having an identity crisis, “now. Go home and rest up before practice tomorrow! Bright and early!” 

“Yeah I will. Thank you Meredith. Really.” 

Kent stands up with Halvo and the two of them leave to Meredith giving them a jaunty wave. When they’re out in the hallway, door closed to Mer’s office, Halvo tugs Kent in by the shoulders as they walk down the hallway. They don’t say anything as they head towards the garage where players and staff park. It feels like Halvo is trying to pass something more than just the C on to him. His confidence maybe. His respect. Like he’s trying to let Kent know he’s proud of him. 

When they reach the garage, and their cars, Halvo stops. He lets his arm leave Kent’s shoulder and ruffles his blond hair again, “you’re going to be great, kid.” He shoves at Kent’s shoulder with a smile, and then he’s getting into his car before Kent can say anything else. 

Kent himself is home before he knows it. When he unlocks his door, sweater clutched in one hand, Kit is at the door waiting for him. She rubs against his ankles with loud chirps. He’ll come back and pet her, give her lots of attention, in just a few minutes. Right now though he heads to his room and closes the door behind him. Sitting on his bed, Kent holds the jersey in his hands, thumb tracing over the outline of the C. Over and over and over. It finally hits him then, what this all means. 

And the tears are so sudden, and so forceful, that he’d have no chance to stop them even if he was trying. His entire body starts to shake with the cries he’s letting out. The jersey is still clutched tightly, but now he’s holding it against his chest like it’s the one life line he has left. He doesn’t have Jack, he doesn’t have Halvo anymore. All he has is the C on this jersey telling him that he’s good enough. Finally, he’s good enough for someone. Even if someone is the Aces management.

The sudden magnitude of his loneliness sets in. This isn’t what he wants. This isn’t the life he wanted for himself. Sitting on his bed and crying from the sheer gratitude that getting the C would bring him. He suddenly wants Jack more than he has in the longest of times. He wants to tell him. He wants to talk to him. Jack was always good at rationalizing the things that Kent couldn’t. If anyone could have talked him through this. And Jack was the only captain besides Halvo that Kent knew. He was lost. He didn’t have a single fucking clue what he was doing. 

Against better judgement, Kent grabs his phone and quickly dials the number he doesn’t really need in his contacts, but that he knows by heart. It rings, and it rings, and it rings. And Kent isn’t surprised by that at all. Really he isn’t. When it goes to voicemail though, the part where he normally hangs up when he’s been missing Jack more than normal, he lets it go through the prompts and he actually leaves a message this time. 

“Hey. It’s me. I… I know you probably don’t want to talk to me right now. That’s… that’s fine. I mean it. If you don’t want to you can delete this right now. But if by some chance you’re still listening to this I… Jesus I miss you Jack. And I know that’s stupid to say because of course I do but… I go through so many things here and sometimes the first thing I think is that I wish I could tell you. That I wish you knew what was going on in my life because you were one of the only people who really got it, and got me. Not even… just… just as friends. We were such good fucking friends. I know… I know that things weren’t… they weren’t right back then Jack. I understand that now but Jesus I never wanted to do this without you. I still don’t want to do this without you… but I just. I just want to know you’re okay. That’s all. I’m so sorry for everything I missed. For everything I should have done better. I… I wasn’t always understanding and that’s my fault Jack. I should have been more understanding. I’m sorry I couldn’t be the person you needed me to be. I just… I just wanted to tell you that. I’m going… I’m going to let you go now. I hope wherever you are… whatever you’re doing right now, that it’s making you happy. God I hope you’re happy Jack. Bye.” 

Kent presses the end button on his phone and sets it down on his bedside table. He feels better… a little bit. He knows Jack won’t call him back, but being able to get it off of his chest has been somewhat cathartic. At least Jack knows now, at least Kent has said it. The guilt of not being enough to help him isn’t eating away at him any longer, he thinks. Kent flops backwards on his bed, the tears are still falling slowly and he’s sure his face is red and blotchy just like it always gets when he cries. 

Kent falls asleep like that, still clutching the jersey to his chest. 

 

****

 

Kent gets to practice purposefully late that day. He wants to be able to get out on the ice last, without anyone on the team seeing him in his jersey. When he gets to the practice arena, and walks by the ice where everyone else is already geared up they yell at him good naturedly about being late. Kent just yells back at them, not bothering to scan the ice for Jeff. He might turn around and go home if he makes eye contact with him now. 

When he gets into the locker room he’s quick about suiting up. Shin pads, pants, skates. And then he’s looking down at the jersey in his hands again. He takes a deep sigh, centers himself, and pulls it on over his head. His heart is going a mile a minute and the deep, heavy, feeling in his stomach is growing heavier by the second. He makes his way down the tunnels from the locker room to the ice. When he gets there, he pauses for a moment, still in the dark, still out of view, and takes one more deep breath before pushing off and gliding easily over the smooth ice and over to where Brownie is standing with his defensive partner, Mikko. 

Brownie gives him a smile, “what’s up dude.” He reaches out for a fist bump and then freezes. Mikko is already staring next to him. 

“Holy shit.” Mikko says in loud accented English. 

“Holy shit is right.” Brownie says back. When he looks back up at Kent’s face he’s grinning big and wide, “Holy shit, Parser! Come here you asshole!” Brownie is picking him up off the ice, swinging him. 

He’s gotten the attention of the rest of the team on the ice now. Misha, Kent’s Right Winger line mate is skating over with Doc, who plays right wing for the second line, “Why are we swinging Parse like ragdoll? Is birthday today?” 

“Nah birthday is on stupid american holiday,” Doc says grinning, “when he likes to say all fireworks are for him. Must be something else.” 

“Hey, did parse finally pull a puck bunny!” Carl yells from across the ice. 

“Jesus, put me down Harris!” Kent laughs, the enthusiasm is getting to him. 

“Ohhh he call by first name. Must be serious.” Misha teases. 

And then Brownie does put him down. And when Kent is no longer being squished against Brownie’s chest, his chest is visible to the rest of the ice. Everyone can see the C emblazoned on his chest. Without warning there’s an entire mob of grown men around him, squishing him in between padded chests and arms. The roar of everyone’s shouting in Russian, in English, in French, in every other language they’ve got represented on their team is deafening. It all sounds like one noise, Kent can’t even hear a single individual word above the uproar. 

When the team wide celly has dissipated a little bit and Kent can skate backwards some into his own space, he notices Jeff standing on the outside of the circle. Maybe close enough that no one would notice he wasn’t actively celebrating in the group hug and yell, but Kent knows he wasn’t there. The two of them make eye contact for one split second. Jeff looks like a ghost. Like someone just punched him in the face or said the worst possible thing to him that they could think of. It makes Kent want to sink into a hole. It makes him want to disappear. Jeff looks like he’s gotten the worst news of his life when Kent was getting one of the best of his. 

He looks away almost as quickly as he caught Jeff’s eye. They’ve been practicing on each other’s line all of the practices they’ve had leading up to preseason. They’d done amazing together but… Kent can’t imagine that it’s going to go well this time around. Maybe since he’s captain now he might be able to gently suggest moving Scraps up to first line Center instead. Make some bullshit excuse about how Jeff and Jojo work better together. 

It feels like the worst lie he could tell. 

 

****

 

When practice is over (disastrous. Coach ended up switching Scraps and Jeff anyways) Kent is stripping down in the locker room, this time with everyone else around him. Jeff is silent, stripping quickly and trying to get out as soon as possible. Brownie is seemingly determined to not let Kent dwell on it because he’s next to him every second in the locker room. Talking, yelling, congratulating, chirping. He ropes Mikko and Doc in on it too so it doesn’t look like he’s trying to monopolize Kent. But Kent knows it’s also so it looks like everyone is making their rounds so it’s less suspicious that Jeff definitely isn’t. 

He’s lost in thought, he doesn’t even hear the jingling of his cell phone from in between his and Carl’s stalls. Carl picks up his phone, about to hand it to Kent, but not before looking at the caller ID that’s on the screen first, “Hey Cap! Someone named Zimms is calling!” Carl has the most obnoxiously loud mouth in the entirety of the world. 

Time feels like it’s frozen still. He must have misheard Carl. He takes the phone from him and sure enough Zimms is big and bold on the incoming call screen. The little hockey stick emoji next to it like it’s been for years. Kent stares at it, not quite sure what to do. This is the wrong time to answer though, he knows that. He looks back up and sees Brownie’s concerned face, and see’s Jeff’s… Jeff’s something. It’s dark and stormy and Kent has no idea what’s going on. He lets it ring to voicemail. He’ll call Jack back. He’ll… fuck he’ll call Jack back. He doesn’t know when he’s stopped being able to say that, but saying it again, even in his head feels great. Kent throws the rest of his clothes on, not even bothering to shower before he tosses everything else into his duffel and leaves to shouts of “Cap! Cap! Cap!” behind him and Jeff’s back. 

 

****

When he gets home he stares at his phone screen for a moment. It was probably just Jack telling him to delete his number. Like that would even matter since Kent has it memorized from the days where it would get used five or six times. He takes a deep breath. Intending to call back, let it go to voicemail again and just telling Jack’s voicemail that he’ll delete his number, it’s okay. It’s been half an hour since Jack called and Kent is finally just getting the courage to hit the green phone button. 

It rings. 

Once.

Twice.

Then nothing. 

Then. 

“Kenny?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Listen one of my favorite tropes is Kent and Jack and reconciled friendship.  
> This is where the canon divergence tag comes into place. Everything else will remain true to canon other than Kent crashing Epikegster. 
> 
> If you have any questions about the fic or just want to yell with me, find me on tumblr at wjpoindexters!


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am so sorry that it took me so long to get this out. Anyways, I hope it was worth the wait!

Preseason starts as it normally does, with very few people in the arena and games that start at 5pm for some reason. Kent hates preseason. He hates playing the same couple of teams over and over again until the monotony feels like it’s going to melt his brain. The good thing about preseason though, especially this preseason is that now Jack answers his texts every now and then. The last two weeks have been awkward with them. Sometimes Kent will text Jack and not receive a text back for a few days, but he’s okay with that. All Kent wants is his best friend back, and if he has to do it one painfully awkward text message at a time, he’ll do that.

Jack almost never texts him first though. Except today. Kent is finishing showering up, pulling his suit back on after their second preseason game against Arizona, nothing spectacular. A 2-1 win for the Aces. He’s finally got everything put away and put on, nothing else to do but go home, so he checks his phone and sees a text from Jack.

_You play better with Troy at your Center._

And leave it to Jack to skip all formality and just dive right into critiquing their game. Half of Kent feels like he should be a little upset that that’s all Jack can think to say to him, but the other half of him knows that this is a part of how Jack shows he cares. And it reminds him that Jack is watching his games, even if they’re only their preseason games. It makes Kent feel better about their friendship if Jack is willing to watch his games.

_Do you ever get tired of being right all the time?_

Kent locks his phone and shoves it back into his pocket. Maybe they’ll get past talking just about hockey. But Kent is okay with that being the only thing they talk about for now. He’s about to make his way out of the locker room when he gets hip checked on either side. Brownie swings an arm around his shoulders on his left and on his right is Rafael Oliveira, one of Aces Centers.

“So I’ve noticed that you’ve been going home all by yourself the last couple of weeks.” Olive says jostling Kent a little.

“And that you haven’t been coming out for team bonding at all.” Brownie says on the other side of him.

“Yeah because I don’t want to hang out with the two of you.” Kent laughs, elbowing the two of them in the sides.  
Olive grabs his waist and falls down in the middle of the hallway, “I’ve been hit!”

“You’ve been hit alright,” Brownie scoffs, “hit with a case of dumbass.”

Kent is watching them with a smile on his face. He’s about to lean down and help Olive off the floor when the sound of a voice from behind them makes him start.

“You all mind not laying in the middle of the hallway?” Jeff is standing behind them, an annoyed expression on his face.

“Hey sour grapes! Wanna come hang out with us? We’re forcing Kent into bonding time again.” Olive is grinning at him, still on the floor.

“Can’t. Have stuff to do.” Jeff’s tone is clipped and Kent can’t even look at his face. It doesn’t matter though because Jeff is making his way around the three of them and heading down the hallway that leads into the parking garage.

When he’s out of sight, Kent reaches his hand down and helps Olive up. Olive looks at him and Brownie, “he’s like your guys’ best friend right? What the hell has been up with him lately?”

If there’s anything Kent has learned in the short 20 years he’s been alive, it’s been to always get context for something before screwing yourself over on accident so he asks, “what do you mean?”

“Like… okay listen. Don’t take this the wrong way because I know you two are tight,” and Olive crosses his middle and pointer finger around each other, a visual for exactly how tight they are, “but he’s been a real dick recently.” Brownie snorts from beside Kent, “and everyone has noticed it Parser. He’s standoffish, he hasn’t been hanging out with anyone, he hasn’t even talked to you in the locker room and you two used to take up so much practice time yapping at each other.”

Kent wants to say he hasn’t noticed. That nothing is different, that Jeff’s just been not feeling good the last couple of weeks, but all of those would be lies and Kent has no poker face, “I’m not sure what he’s been going through. Everyone has a slump though. Maybe he just needs some time.”

“Yeah time to get the fuck over it.” Brownie mutters from beside them, and Kent… well Brownie hasn’t said anything bad about Jeff like ever, hasn’t even said anything mildly disparaging since the whole scene in his apartment a few weeks back.

Olive just shrugs his shoulders, “whatever man. Sucks for Jeff though. Getting moved down and everything. It’s starting to affect the way he plays. And like no offense to Scraps, but you play better with Jeff and everyone is gossiping like a bunch of old Brazilian grandmas”

Kent just groans, if there’s anything he hates, it’s in-team gossip and fighting. Nothing ruins moral worse than that. Nothing ruins chances at winning than when none of your teammates trust you on the ice, let alone off of it. Brownie claps him on the shoulder, and squeezes a little for comfort.

“Don’t worry about it man, I’m sure he’ll come along eventually. And anyways, Olive is about to make us like secret Brazilian comfort food, so you can cry over that.”

Olive smiles, big and bright like he always does, “yeah man, it's going to be awesome just wait.”

 

***

 

“This is absolutely the best thing I’ve ever put in my mouth and I’m going to kidnap you and force you to cook this for me all the time.” Kent moans shoveling another forkful of beans, bacon, and eggs into his mouth.

“Oooh kinky Parse, I like it.” Olive winks at him from across the table.

Kent can tell Brownie is watching him. Watching for him to freeze up, watching for him to deflect. Ever since Brownie found out about Kent he’s been… watchful. On one hand Kent appreciates it, but on the other hand he thinks Brownie might be doing it because of some misplaced guilt that he never caught the things that made Kent uncomfortable before hand. Like he’s ready to jump in anytime Kent might feel even mildly uncomfortable. Kent… well it makes Kent feel all soft inside that he has someone looking out for him, but it’s also starting to give him anxiety that someone will notice Brownie staring all the time and have it spiral into some big “thing.”

“Yeah whatever. Admit it. You’d rather be cooking amazing food all day than trying to score goals.”

“Trying?” Olive looks affronted, hand to his heart, “I don’t try anything, I score goals all the time.”

“Yeah you score goals on your ass.” Kent shoots back.

“Yeah Olive remember your last goal? ‘I got it, I got it!’ and then total wipe out like you’re still playing mite.”

“Hey at least I didn’t swing my stick like it was a baseball bat and smack a dude in the face. ‘It wasn’t a high stick ref! It’s not my fault he’s so short!’” Olive says, trying to imitate Brownie’s voice, “like that was going to work.”

Brownie is grinning, “It really wasn’t my fault that that dude was so short. Like… Marchand short you know?”

“Like Parser short.” Olive cackles at his own joke.

“Haha yuck it up. It’s only preseason and I almost have more goals than the two of you combined had last season.” Kent sticks his tongue out at them, mostly because he’s a child.

“Yeah well we can’t all be the King of Vegas or whatever new fancy name they’re going to give you this year.” Brownie sticks his tongue out at him.

“How mad do you think Rangers fans are going to get if we started calling you the King? Like how mad? Really mad?” Olive asks scooping more food onto his plate.

“We’d never be able to play them every again. People would start throwing little Elvis dolls at Parse everywhere we went.” Brownie makes a throwing motion with his arm.

“Can you even buy Elvis dolls? Like stuffed Elvis’?”

“I don’t know man, I bet Etsy has it. Etsy has everything-”

Kent would normally at least pretend to listen to Brownie and Olive’s conversation but his pants started vibrating as soon as Olive mentioned him getting boo’d by Rangers fans or whatever. Looking at his phone now, he has four missed texts from Jack. Which again is surprising. Jack normally texts on the two opposite spectrums. Either everything is in one nice long text, or its a simple straight to the point answer.

_J: Can’t say that I do._

_J: I am right though. You play better with Troy on your line._

_J: It doesn’t make sense that they moved him off. He hasn’t stopped producing enough and he isn’t recovering from any injury. Why did they move him?_

_J: I shouldn’t have asked that. Never mind._

Kent rolls his eyes. Even if Jack is right, that Kent shouldn’t be talking about line changes with someone who isn’t his team or his coach Jack isn’t… well Jack isn’t a busy body. He’s only asking because it legitimately doesn’t make sense to him. He wouldn’t tell anyone either. Maybe Bob, but Kent can’t imagine a conversation where that would ever be pertinent or even one where he would be brought up. Plus he’s like trying to open up more or whatever… maybe communicating about the things that are bothering him might help their friendship more this time around.

_K: Honest answer? Jeff’s mad at me and our on ice chemistry has gone completely down the drain. Passes weren’t connecting, one of us was never where we needed the other to be, we were throwing pucks to each other blind._

_J: On ice chemistry? You have off ice chemistry with Troy?_

Kent raises his brows at that. He knows Jack isn’t actually inquiring if he and his teammate are doing the nasty behind closed doors or whatever, but the illogical side of him can’t help but to poke at it, even if it’s going to sting.

_K: Uh, no. I thought I was dating a teammate a few years back, turns out it wasn’t anything that special and then he didn’t talk to me for a few years so I think I’m going to stay off that train._

Kent honestly has no idea why he even sent that. The anxiety after he sees the ‘delivered’ message pop up is starting to settle deep and ugly in the pit of his stomach. He should probably just turn his phone off now, catch a boat to Greenland and drop his phone in the ocean on the way and live with a herd of sheep for the rest of his life. He’s actually about to turn his phone off because why deal with adult conversations and emotions when you can just ignore him, but his phone starts buzzing incessantly, letting him know he has an incoming call. When he looks down he sees Jack’s name pop up on his phone.

“Hey, I have to take this. From my manager, you know how that is.”

Brownie and Olive are throwing more chirps at him as he finds his way to Olive’s bedroom for some privacy. When he’s gotten the door shut he answers the phone.

“I don’t know why I said that, I’m sor-”

But Jack cuts him off before he can finish the sentence, “I thought we were dating. I just… when everything happened and you kept calling I… I didn’t know how to tell you I needed space. I didn’t know how to tell you back then that if I was going to get better I needed you to not be there.”

Kent doesn’t know how to respond to that but he tries to keep a level head anyways, “you needed me gone to get better? Do I… I was making it worse? Jack you called me back, if you didn't want to talk to me you shouldn’t have called me back. I… I know I didn’t make that better, leaving you messages but I…” he trails off. He doesn’t know what to say.

“It wasn’t just you Kent. It wasn’t… you weren’t the reason.”

“I was just one of them.”

Kent can hear Jack take a deep breath, “you were one of them.”

And that… well of course it hurts. It stings like hell and Kent can feel the hot prick of tears forming in the corners of his eyes. He reaches his arm up and rubs them off on the back of his hand so they don’t spill over. If they don’t spill over he can say he never actually cried about it.

“I should let you go.” Kent says quietly and he thinks he may mean it in more than one way.

There’s a hitch in Jack’s voice, “we were dating.”

“Who was dating?”

“You and me.” Jack clarifies, “we were… we didn’t know what we were doing. We hurt each other even when we didn’t mean to and it wasn’t… we can’t go back to that but… we were dating, and you were… you were my best friend Kenny, that never changed I just… I couldn’t stop remembering every bad thing every time I saw your face or heard your voice.”

Kent is quiet for a few moments. He has a habit of just saying whatever he wants when it pops into his head and he doesn’t want this moment to be one of those times. He wants this to go better. He wants to be better this time.

“And now?”

“What about now?”

“When you hear my voice what do you think about now? Is it still.. Is it still bad?”

Jack is quiet, “sometimes… but… but not in the way it was the first time. Sometimes I think about you or hear your dumb laugh in my head when we text and I think about the what ifs and that’s… that’s not… I can’t do that.”

Kent doesn’t know what to say here. He feels like he should say sorry, but he hurts too and he doesn’t think this is something he should apologize for. Making the draft, going to Vegas, that wasn’t ever his fault. Wasn’t something that he owed an apology on. It might just sound fake if he tries, so he doesn’t. Jack saves him from having to say anything though because he continues talking.

“But I… I think I can move past it. I can think about the what ifs the same way other people do. I can miss you as my best friend even if I acknowledge that I need to leave the other part of you behind.”

“The part of me that was more than just a friend?” Kent asks, even though he knows the answer.

Jack’s voice is more resolute than Kent has heard it this entire conversation, “yes. I think we both need to leave ourselves behind. Those parts of ourselves. Remembering is… its fine. It’s natural but…”

“But moving on is natural too and we need to let that happen?” Kent ponders.

Jack sounds relieved this time, “yeah. Is that… is that something you can do?”

“I… I already did Jack. I just want my friend back. Nothing more… nothing less.”

There’s a pause in the conversation again and it’s making Kent anxious. He starts to fidget with a frey in his pants with the hand that isn’t holding the phone. The only reason he knows Jack hasn’t hung up the phone is because he can still hear him breathing softly on the other line.

“You already moved on… your uh… you have off ice chemistry with Troy too, eh?”

Kent can feel his face get red. He’s happy that he’s only on the phone with Jack because if he could see his face right now he’d zero in on it like a bloodhound sniffing something out, “I don’t… I don’t know.”

“You don’t know?” Jack sounds like he’s in disbelief.

“Yeah I don’t know I just… I thought we did, maybe. And then he stopped talking to me because apparently I was getting too invested in his life, in Billie’s life… you know like I always do.”

“Billie?”

“His daughter.”  
“Oh… Kent.” and Kent can hear the pitying tone in his voice, and he doesn’t care so much about the fact that Jack knows him so well he knows why Kent getting attached is an issue here, but he cares that he’s apparently so predictable that Jack isn’t even surprised.

“Yeah well it doesn’t matter because he let it be pretty known that I wasn’t welcome in their lives so it doesn’t matter. Can we stop talking about this please. It’s giving me a headache.” And anxiety, and a lump in his throat that’s threatening to make him start crying.

“Yeah we can stop talking about it.”

Kent smiles, wiping the tears welling in his eyes so they don’t fall, “thanks. Listen I have to go I’m at a teammates house so they’re probably wondering where I went.”

“Yeah you should go,” there’s a beat of silence and then Jack says, “if you um… need to talk about it more I can listen?”

Kent scoffs at how awkward Jack sounds about offering to listen to all of Kent’s romantic problems, “its okay, we aren’t there yet.” It hurts to admit especially since they used to be there. They used to be in a position where Kent could share anything with Jack and Jack could… well he never felt comfortable doing it, but he could have if he wanted to.

Jack is silent for a moment, but when he answers his voice is unwavering, “We aren’t. And maybe we’ll never be but uh… I wouldn’t… I don’t think I would hate getting there again. As friends.”

“Yeah as friends. That sounds good.” Kent nods his head even though he knows Jack can’t see it.

There’s a soft click from the other end and Kent knows that Jack has hung up. He locks his phone screen and puts it in his pocket. When he makes it back to the table Olive and Brownie have moved onto the avocado ice cream that Kent can’t stand but for some reason everyone else is in love with.

“I would offer you a bite,” Olive says grinning at him, “but I keep this kind specifically in my freezer because you’re an ice cream stealer and you hate this so.”

“Yeah yeah, yuck it up. I’m going to start stocking my fridge with everything I know you hate so you can’t come steal my food all the time.”

Brownie laughs at Olive, “you are such a hypocrite. I think you like ate all of the pot roast I had pushed to the back of my fridge.”

Olive shrugs his shoulders, dipping his spoon back into the carton of green ice cream, “hey what are friends for if not for eating your leftovers?”

Kent is sitting there watching them bicker good naturedly when it feels like a sudden fire has been lit directly under his ass. What are friends for? Kent feels like he used to know. He used to have a best friend and lost him. Then he got another best friend and lost him too. And now it feels like he’s still teetering so close on the edge of never talking to Jack again for the second time that even when they’re conversations seem to be going okay he can’t keep the ugly voice in his head from telling him it's only a matter of time.

And he… well he doesn’t want to lose another friend like he lost Jack. He doesn’t want to wake up one morning and wonder why he and Jeff couldn’t keep their friendship. Doesn’t want to wonder if there was anything he could have done to fix it before it became so irreparable that it took a mental break down on his part to start mending again. And sure, he and Jack are mending their friendship with scotch tape right now, but he thinks eventually that’ll turn into duck tape, and eventually that’ll turn into gorilla glue, and then maybe concrete, if they’re lucky. But he doesn’t want to take a sledgehammer to his and Jeff’s relationship.

And maybe part of it is that he finally has realized in the last week that he really isn’t in love with Jack anymore and he’s… well he might be a little in love with someone else. Even if he would never say it out loud. But the point is, there is a fire lit under him and if he doesn’t go over to Jeff’s right now to… well he isn’t sure what he’s going to do he might just explode. He grabs his keys off the table where Olive and Brownie are sitting, still arguing about food.

“Where are you going?” Olive asks around the spoon in his mouth.

“I… I think I need to talk to Jeff.”

Brownie gives him a withering look, “you think that’s a good idea?”

Kent shrugs, “it’s probably a terrible idea but… I’m tired of losing friends.”

“Well I say go for it,” Olive points at him with the spoon, “because I am tired of Jeff being an angsty asshole. He was way more fun when you two weren’t fighting so if you can figure that out.”

“Text us and let us know how it goes?” Brownie asks.

“Yeah I wanna know if he’s going to be in a good mood tomorrow morning or if I have to go buy like actual ice cream for you for later.” Olive adds.

“Yeah I’ll live tweet the whole thing.” Kent rolls his eyes, but he’s slipping on his shoes and leaving Olive’s place before either one of them can say anything else.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know some of you said you were excited to see what that first conversation between Jack and Kent was going to be from the end of last chapter. I might write it as an extra later on, but it just didn't fit the way I wanted it to so I opted for it to be something that happened off screen. 
> 
> As always, thank you for reading!

**Author's Note:**

> Come visit me on Tumblr (wjpoindexters) I take prompts almost all the time and I love talking to people!


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